Chemically Combined
by AzikaRue394
Summary: Mariam has a poolside accident and ends up hospitalized. A visit from a special someone brightens up her day.


This is dedicated to my precious reviewers on the last one: Valxb and Macy(Demolition-Girl-33236).

FYI: Mer is pronounced 'mare'.

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot line and Kelsi, Cayden, and Melanie.

Hope you all like it!

* * *

**Chemically Combined**

It was a bright, sunny day right smack in the middle of July complete with clear blue skies and that terribly sticky type of heat. A shrill whistle sounded over the community pool.

"No running on the deck!"

"Yeah! Sure thing babe!"

"Oh great, an arrogant excuse for a man wanting nothing but a younger woman with a nice body." the girl mumbled to herself, sweeping a cerulean blue section of her hair over her shoulder.

Another whistle pierced the thick humidity.

"No hitting on the lifeguards!"

Mariam laughed and turned to look at her friend Melanie. Melanie and Mariam had been taken on as lifeguards for the summer in a small suburb of New York City while they were between semesters in college.

"You tell 'im Mel!" Mariam shouted through giggles to the darkly tanned girl, owing to her African heritage.

"Mariam!" said girl turned to the tan, blond boy, Cayden, at the the snack counter. "Need me to beat anyone up for you?" he flexed his muscles with a goofy smile playing on his face.

"I don't know Cay." Leslie, another carrot-haired lifeguard said, "Maybe we should let their love blossom."

Mariam roller her eyes and got back to work.

"No pushing on the diving board!"

A few hours and many whistle blows later the two college friends were closing with the help of Kelsi, and Cayden.

"Done with my work, mates." Cayden said as he left the snack bar. "I'm off, hope you don't mind."

"No we don't mind, mate." Kelsi did a rather bad impression of the boy's Australian accent humor evident in her green eyes.

"Shut up." Cayden smiled as he left through the mens' locker room.

"Well I guess it's just us three." Kelsi stated as she swept off the deck.

Melanie was busy checking the lifeguards' posts for left items as she answered, "Three," she sang, "is the magic number."

"Yes it is," Mariam picked up, "it's the magic number!"

"Can you guys go two seconds without singing?!" Lesli demanded playfully.

"We go to Julliard," Melanie gathered her black hair into a ponytail, "it's what we do."

"Yeah, it runs through our veins." the ocean-haired woman agreed as she strolled over to pick up the bucket of pool chemicals the girls were instructed to pour into the pool every evening.

The pool's owner was a stickler for sanitation, so she used the strongest cleaning chemicals possible. Being so strong made them, of course, quite dangerous; the cleaner needed to be in the water for at least twelve hours before it was safe to swim.

"My ancestors were slaves singing hymns in the cotton fields." Melanie informed, "You could say this is my destiny." the dark girl finished dramatically.

"A lifeguard?" The red head looked straight up to the lifeguard's chair only to receive a face full of warm bottled water.

"Ugh! Hey, you come down here!"

Melanie climbed down and proceeded to be chased through the grassy field adjacent to the opposite side of the pool.

Mariam laughed along with the other two as she swung the bucket. The blunette would never know what'd been going through her heat at that moment. Somehow she had managed to think the bucket was totally full when in reality it was already half empty. She swung too hard.

Some of the container's contents landed in the pool, but the rest splashed Mariam right in the face, blinding her.

"Aaaahh!" she screamed, falling backwards, her hands immediately flying up to cover her eyes. The sound of two pairs of feet padding their way towards her on the poolside deck filled her ears.

Lesli arrived first and yanked Mariam's hands away to assess the damage. The victims eyes were scarily bloodshot and second-degree chemical burns were already forming on her face and hands.

Melanie reached the fallen girl next, "Mer, can you see?"

"It's all dark and blurry!" the girl sounded panic-stricken.

"Lesli, go and get the eye cleaning stuff and call an ambulance!"

Lesli ran off to perform her assigned tasks. Melanie, meanwhile, was trying to calm Mariam, who was shouting rapidly in Spanish and Japanese as pain impacted the sensitive nerves of her face.

"Mariam calm down! You're going to start hyperventilating! And I don't speak Spanish or Japanese or Chinese or whatever!"

Mariam ceased the shouting but continued to whimper and cry, the salty tears stinging the burns.

Lesli returned and the duo worked together to flush out the girl's eyes by repeatedly tilting her head back and squeezing some of the cleanser out into her open eyes.

"Any better?" Lesli questioned after they'd been at it for a while.

"A little, I guess." Mariam seemed petrified and fainted from exhaustion just before the siren of the approaching ambulance was heard.

* * *

When Mariam awoke she opened her eyes, or tried to rather, but she fount that portions of her face from her nose up were totally covered with bandages including her eyes. She would've gone into panic mode again if her friends hadn't chosen to make themselves known.

"Mariam?"

"Raul!" the girl recognized his voice at once and turned towards where she thought the words had originated. "Raul?" she extended a hand in his direction.

Raul grabbed the bandaged appendage and moved to sit on the bed. "I'm here. Do you know how worried you had me?" Mariam could imagine his eyes shining bright from concern.

"How did you find out? I thought you had summer classes."

"I texted him while we were on the way here." Melanie spoke for the first time.

"Where exactly is here?" the blunette asked settling back down onto some pillows.

"The hospital of course." Melanie stated as if Mariam were losing her mind.

"Well sorry I'm a bit slow. It's not like I can see anything!"

"Yeah but-"

The small argument was interrupted by a knock at the door. The African-American girl rose to answer it. She opened the door and couldn't stop herself from gaping open-mouthed at the young man's handsomeness.

She had been expecting some crusty old nurse but instead she got bright blue eyes, shocking blond hair framing a slightly boyish, freckled face and a muscular yet slim build that she knew from somewhere.

"You must be Max, that gorgeous guy Mariam's got in multiple frames all over our apartment." the dark-haired girl smiled having finally placed the male.

"Can I-" Max started, a worried slump to his features.

"Come on in!" Melanie interrupted, stepping aside. "Mariam, Gorgeous is here to see you! C'mon Raul." she dragged the circus boy out of the room. "Let's give them some time alone."

"Wait!" Raul said, gripping the door frame to keep himself in the room as she constantly tugged at his arm. "Julia told me to tell you that if you go blind on her she'll kill you." he addressed the girl in bed.

"Nice Raul," the dark girl said sarcastically, "real nice!"

"It's just what she told me to say!" Raul defended as he was pulled down the hall by Melanie.

Mariam turned to the door as her their voices faded down the hallway.

"Who-" the oceanette was broken off as a pair of soft lips met and caressed hers. "Max!" she exclaimed breathlessly as he pulled away.

"You scared me!" the blond scolded, "Don't ever, _ever_ do that again!"

"It really is you." Mariam murmured, ignoring the scolding.

She brought her hands up to his hair and felt the golden, sunny rays she knew so well. She clasped the sides of her boyfriend's face and felt his ears. He closed his eyes as her thumbs traveled over his soft eyelids and smiled as she traced his supple lips with a single pointer finger. It really _was_ Max; she'd memorized his every detail.

"I've missed you." the girl snaked her arms around the older man's waist and nuzzled her face into his chest.

Max ran his fingers through her hair and tenderly kissed the top of her head.

"I've missed you too, darling."

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So...R&R please!!


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